Originally posted on Tribe.net Blog
I love hostel stays.
Hostels are really great places for potential and sometimes actual CMNM experiences. More than the erotically suggestive nature, the real chance to meet people from all walks of life and to become authentic -- even if only temporarily - buddies or friends. There is just something about being a fellow sojourner that brings out the 'best' in a person (well.. I think it does for me). I've posted on this topic before but there's not very much reaction - although my take on hosteling (and the pleasure it affords) has changed recently.
In some ways, being on Tribe.net (also some of the other alternative life-style social networking sites ) is a lot like living in a hostel with a set of unique and slightly strange (if not almost perverted) bunk of quirky people. In real life, there aren't that many places - in the modern and average working-man world -- that you can really let your hair down and let your personality and anatomy all hang out (LOL - in a manner of speaking). On a recent stopover trip to NYC, I had intended to stay in a hostel situation. But unfortunately, I couldn't get a reservation at any place I really want to 'experience'. So I settled on another kind of alternative accommodations: the YMCA Club hotels - this time the West Side YMCA.
I realize I am getting a bit off-subject but it IS directly or indirectly related to CMNM or male-to-
male flashing. Saunas (gay sex clubs/baths) are not totally banned in NYC but it seems that true gay baths ALMOST are- unless you don't count East Side Club or the West Side Club. While I was staying at the West Side YMCA, I visited the West Side Club (no relation, similar name only) on two nights and found it OK enough to go back for more. They charged an initial membership fee ($15?) but you get a 30-day member's card, which allows for 5 visits (just pay for a room (or locker). I recommend a room and it's customary to give a tip to the staffer who leads you to your room. There were a variety of men but there was virtually no sex in the corridors or open areas - it was confined to the private rooms with the doors closed -- which was somewhat disappointing.
At West Side Club, the is only one small shower room, and the sauna was not working (or appeared to be closed) - which may be connected to fact that the sauna room was also closed at the West Side YMCA, where I stayed two nights. At the Y, a sign was posted saying that it was closed by order of the City Board of Health. Was it just this one that had not passed inspection or is the NYC Board of Health systematically shutting down all public saunas? Sort of like - cleaning out the porn and prostitutes out of Times Square? Go figure.
I have love staying at hostels - not just for the economy, and also not just because I have an 'excuse' to be naked in front to strangers (which is always fun), but I have found now that they are enjoyable even more for the chance for camaraderie and acceptance from new acquaintances and potential friends. Initially, I saw it as a way to flash people whose reactions you could see and who can't quite run away. But now, I find that being accepted for being myself is working like a kind of therapy and giving me less reason/compulsion to 'flash' or get naked in front of strangers (not that I ever really did it blatantly anyway - but the fantasy and compulsivity had been growing for the last few years whether I actually acted on it or not).
More recently, I have found that I really enjoy getting to know
the people I am 'living' with in the hostel. I guess it comes from my not acting anything but myself -- I feel free to be me - kinky, profane, but passionate, caring, and adventurous too. I seemed to be (socially) rewarded for the very things that might be 'pervs' in someone else's book. So I've started to see hostels in a whole new light. Still, there are not all like that. I guess it depends on how long you stay - and whether your roomies are ready and willing to socialize. It also matters whether they are willing to accept your 'uniqueness' (diversity - differences in sexual persuasions - i.e. being gay or a nudist or an exhibitionist.)
Maybe it has everything to do with the location (what hostel, in what city/country, and what the social context is). It was a mixed room for 8 with of them 2 women (who were not together) in Honolulu. We did things together - like going out to clubs, dancing, taking in local sites (North Shore Sunset Beach), swimming and even skinnydipping late on night. Using the same bathroom, shower, watching each other change in the room and at the beach was a kind of therapy -- in one sense. My nudity in the room was either overlooked or just accepted - as was everyone else's. I found I didn't really feel the need to be the perv, who made others leary or uncomfortable (with this group).
I did get naked and erect for the 'benefit' of my opposite bunkmate, but he either didn't care or really didn't notice. Because later, we ended up spending a couple of days together (on another island). I guess too that my personality sort of balanced the one overly macho str8 guy who also seemed to like getting nude, too - although seemed possessed with chasing skirt 24/7. In that setting, he was more like the 'pervert', a ex-crazed, testosterone-drenched horny dog. So I didn't' need or couldn't take that role. He's been traveling for a year and had had some bad experiences so I guess he was 'acting' out like some kind of kid (which he was at 23). He's lost his travel partner and best friend - who had gotten hooked on drugs while in the Caribbean and had had to be shipped home for hospitalization to the Netherlands). There was some secret intrigue (not me) with some gay hanky panky going on between one of our roomies and a guy next door which complicated things. Why they tried so desperately to cover it up (without much success) was beyond me. Overall, it was a very nice time.
A few weeks later, I spent a night in a hostel in NYC (Gershwin Hotel has both private and dorm-style rooms). Life was back to normal -meaning -- I didn't even speak to my roomies (two other young men) except in the dark when I came in after 11pm. There was just one roommate in the room and he appeared asleep. I stripped in the darkened room and took a shower, leaving the door unlocked (on purpose). The second roommate came in and opened the door to the bathroom catching me fully nude. When I came out and finished dressing, he was in bed, pretending not to notice. I had to leave early the next morning but gave him a lot to look at that night since we were the ones on the two bottom bunks. While in NYC, I looked up some other possible hostels. I believe that WestSide Inn (107st) was promising.
Are there other hostels or hotels in NYC that anyone can recommend?
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